Alice was not worried of the unknown. She was worried of what she already knew. She was worried of the promises that the new people were making to her-the ones bringing the people of a fallen Woodbury into their own settlement. The girl felt sorry t...
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A L I C E
ALICE DUNLAP KNEW BETTER than to waste her remaining moments with Carl by counting them. The inventory, of sorts, was cataloged in her brain. Compartmentalized as maintenance of the boy's secret. She existed in a period just before the end. Before it all came crashing down. To her knowledge, nobody else knew the horrors that awaited. Sometimes, Carl played the part so well that Alice begged to question what she found underneath the trash liner, earlier that morning.
The evidence left behind was an irrefutable trace of something that was not to be challenged. Not even in the deepest stages of bargaining could the girl imagine the relief of thinking—for a second—that it wasn't real.
What happened to Carl was real. He was real, for however long the bite allowed him to be.
Carl was grasping onto his limited reality in the form of a gentle grip on Alice's shoulder, his arm draped across her upper back. The two sat atop the thin mattress on the floor of his room. Bent knees and empty boots next to them on the floor. Sleeping bags underneath them, not needed due to the warmth of the morning sun crackling against the window's reflection.
Her back was partially pressed to his front side. His other hand on her bent knee, both arms enveloping her from either side. The boy's body bent to her as he nuzzled his chin onto her shoulder.
"Do you ever think about how this all came to be?" Carl whispered into her neck.
The girl slightly turned her head. Tears began to sting at her eyes. She swallowed the lump in her throat, thankful to be matching such a low volume. Alice wasn't so sure her voice would sound out above a slight crack. "What do you mean?"
"How we started." He lowly exhaled, his breath brushing against the skin of her neck. "When you realized that we might've turned into this."
"Yeah." Alice smirked through her building tears, taking advantage of his gaze being buried in her hair. "Before I even thought it to be possible, I had a dream about you. Short and confusing. Woke up in the prison, alone. Torn to shreds, smelling like stale gunpowder. Yet the thing that changed the most was how I felt about you. That was the scariest part."
Alice wanted to mention how she woke up feeling robbed of Carl by her side. Newfound feelings and the subject nowhere to be seen. Knowing what she knew now—what Carl didn't know she was aware of—the girl avoided adding his lack of presence into the mix.
